[albert_dao]

Hmmm? My apologies, I'm not trying to be confrontational, but I also dislike being taken for an idiot.

Anyway, you are 100% correct, but the context is wrong. DSB's should not be disturbed and that assumes that the user has access to real live sand with real sand dwelling organisms:

- Worms from your live rock are not good enough. They are not true sand dwelling organisms and will not overturn the top layers of your sand. That's why the tracks you see in your sand now are the same tracks you're going to see three days, four weeks, six months from now. At this rate, the removal of detritus is a losing battle and the sand WILL reach critical mass and crash your system. I don't know about the rest of Canada, but no one here brings in live sand. It's not profitable and hard to maintain properly in a retail environment without dedicated holding tanks.

- Non-DSB sandbeds do not develope the type of positive anaerobic activity that people are aiming for. They just collect detritus. Again, the above point applies.

- The only form in which I could possibly justify sand is if a person absolutely cannot stand the look of bare bottom. In that case, a thin layer of sand (less than 0.5") is acceptable as long as it's vacuumed regularily (at least once a week) and replaced every six months.

I have a lot of strong opinions, not because I'm belligerant, but because I have accumulated experience and it does me well to pass on that knowledge.